Mr. Mah is one of the many succesful goldsmiths in Kota Bharu who trades in gold jewelleries and precious stones. He has been in business since 1957 and is recognised as a treasure trove and gold mine, excuse the pun, of information relating to gold business in Kelantan. Through him I came to know that a few years back people were not allowed to buy or sell pure gold as in gold bars but they could purchase ornaments made of gold. This explains why the tok peraihs in the Kota Bahru wet market have their arms, from the elbow to the wrist, fully adorned with gold bangles, to satisfy the primal urge to possess this shiny metal but a the same time to keep on the right side of the law. These gold ornaments were cast in gold that is peculiar to Kelantan, graded as Emas Kelantan, which is actually 22K in international standard or Gold 916 in local.
I have always been perplexed by the standard of measurement use by the Kelantan local in their gold trading. Gold is normally weighed in gram or ounce, but a Kelantanese lady who comes to a gold shop would tell the seller how much gold she wants as in Riyal Berat, like " Please let me have gold bangle worth five riyals in weight". Incidentally Kelantan men do not patronise the gold shop as there is a religious injunction against men wearing gold on their persons, that is the reason they stay in the back ground in the gold business. So how much is a riyal ? Get this, a riyal is a weight of gold equal to 10 pieces of saga seed. I know what a saga seed is. It is a kind of seed from a saga tree ( scientific name Abrus precatorius ), quite small, light in weight, red in colour and very shiny in appearance. I have seen them as common when I was a kid, they were part of my childhood fascination but I hardly come across them anymore. Proton Saga our national car is named after this tree, besides benefitting from the double meaning of saga as in heroic tales. Nowadays with the scarcity of saga seeds, the weight of a riyal is standardised as equivalent to 2.7 grams of gold.
It is only for Kelantan Gold that the riyal is used as measurement. The current price is about RM400.00 for one riyal of gold. Mr. Mah says it used to be RM10.00 many years ago. Thanks to him only now I understand the lingo of my mother and her contemporaries who collectively take it as a matter of course that all the value of the gold in the world is measured Riyal Berat, which until now has been a code that is only understood between the Kelantanese ladies of old.
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